Norton, Andre - Brother To Shadows

Their bargaining obtained the use of four of the swing carrying monsters. Zurzal, with the scanner across his knees, occupied the left swing of the first, Jofre the right. Behind them came Taynad with the Jat, balanced by a selection of equal weight of their gear, and the final bearers transported the rest of their equipment.

The heat as they set out was intense but at least, perched on swings, they were above the insect swarms. Though the constant movement of those seats made the off-world riders a little giddy and queasy, inclined to hold on tightly wherever a good anchorage offered.

U-Ky's caravan was a fairly impressive command and he rode to its head. There was also the bearer who balanced the great weight of the Axe against a tall pile of bundles. Swinging along behind the priest were the robed Deves. Strung out behind came some of the maned people, only a few of them red-maned and the rest as yellow-backed as the tundra.

Their rate of progress was no faster than a ponderous walk; apparently the huge bearers kept to what was a steady pace for them and never displayed any change in gait. Under the climbing and burning sun this travel was misery for the off-worlders and Jofre had to fight to hold on to his patience.

The yellow tundra seemed to stretch forever and though the caravan headed confidently forward, there was no trace of trail or road to be seen, nor any markers rising to guide the unknowing. It must be that the natives were like animals or birds on some of the other worlds which possessed ingrown direction skills.

They made no halt for nooning but as the sun shifted westward there began to show a line of dark marking the junction of sky and land ahead. It was toward that they continued doggedly even as the sun set and the quick dusk of Lochan closed in.

Still the caravan showed no signs of coming to a halt and the off-worlders were decidedly uncomfortable and tired. Then, out of the northern shadows, there shot a beam of light which flickered, Jofre decided after a moment's watching, in a distinct pattern. He was aware of movement on the right-hand swing of the bearer ahead of him; the rider there, one of the yellow manes, had raised what looked like a thick stick. From the tip of that flashed in turn an answer to that flare ahead.

So announced they swung on into what was an encampment, nearly as large as the caravan itself as to numbers. There were no sod buildings here, rather stretches of woven reed mats set to form very crude tentlike enclosures. While awaiting them were not only members of the maned race, and robed Deves, but a new type of Lochanian native. These were short in size, hardly larger than the Jat, and armored—or shelled—with dull green carapace-like body covering from which a wide, also shielded head and thin knobby jointed limbs projected. They did not mingle with those who crowded forward to greet the caravaners, rather held off in a party to themselves.

Jofre, catching good sight of one standing just beneath one of the massed luminous moss torches of the camp, recognized this as a tribesman concerning which there had been a very short note in their scant study tapes. This was a Skrem, one of the nomads whose tribes drifted along the very edge of the Shattered land.

The off-worlders were glad to be able to slide down from their shaking conveyances and immediately sought the outer regions of the camp for relief. Even the issha training, Jofre decided, had not prepared him for such a journey as this had been. He drew a deep breath as he relatched his belt; even another fraction of a time mark might have been a disaster.

The small outlander party was left alone. Their luggage had been carelessly dumped as their bearers trudged mechanically away to the assembly of their own kind. There was no offer of any tent covering, but the three united in piling their equipment so that it gave a measure of shelter and they did not try to approach the low-burning fires which marked the fore of those misshapen tents. They had their trail rations and they selected small shares of those, knowing from the start they must take good care of the highly nourishing, if near-tasteless stuff, since living off the land might be impossible.

The caravaners apparently had a more robust meal to suit them. Joints of some unidentifiable meat were spitted over the fires and then portions sawed off with belt knives to please the diner. Bulging skins appeared also and were passed from hand to hand. The Lochanians, Jofre noted, were quite practiced in the tricky maneuver of throwing back the head and allowing a thick curl of liquid to flow from the lower bag end directly into their mouths.

This informal feasting was still in progress when a party of three approached the impromptu campsite of the off-worlders. Against the glow of one of the fires could be made out the unwieldy bulk of one who could only be the Axe of Rou, attended by one of the Deves, and scuttling along at his side one of the Skrem.

The three from off-world arose, the Jat pushing in behind Taynad, peering around her with timid curiosity.

"Well journeyed," Zurzal had the translator at ready. "What does the Axe desire of this company?"

For a moment or so after he came to a halt the priest merely puffed as if he had made the trip across camp at some labor.

"Strangers, Rou frowns upon your travels."

"How so?"

"The season is late, we move too slowly, there is no entering the Shattered Land after the Wild Winds rise."

"Our pace is one set by you and your people, Axe of Rou. Can it be that Rou now requires that we prove ourselves by finding a faster way to satisfy His bidding in this matter?"

"There is one." The priest paused as if he were undecided about this, as if he were being forced against his will to come to a decision he distrusted. "The Skrem know another path. This is I'On." He indicated the strange native. There was little to be seen in the way of features on that one's face. The helmet (or the outgrowth of natural skull) reached forward in a visor shape which fully shadowed the eyes. Below those half-hidden pits the face narrowed to a sharp point of chin, the nose joined to that in a beaklike extension.

I'On made no move nor sound to acknowledge the introduction. Instead he stepped ahead of the priest to stand directly before the Zacathan, his head moving slowly up and then down, as if he measured the much taller lizard man from head to foot and back again.

Zurzal could not speak any greeting since the other's speech had not been picked up to be read by the translator.

From the Zacathan, the Skrem turned to Jofre, favored him with the same scrutiny, passed on to Taynad, and last of all shot his head a little forward as if to get a better look at the Jat, which had squeaked and withdrawn nearly behind the girl.

Having submitted them all to some form of his own measurement, the Skrem returned to the Zacathan.

What issued from the beak mouth was a chittering sound not unlike that Jofre had heard the hive man give back on Wayright.

"Why hunt you ghosts?" sputtered the translator.

"To learn," Zurzal returned briefly.

"To learn what?"

"The ways of the past."

"Those of the silences are eaters of men. Would you fill their pots joyfully?"

"I would learn of them—"

"There are always fools in the world." The contempt of that pushed even through the translator. "Well, what have you to offer, fool, to be taken to meet the results of your folly?"

"What do you ask, I'On?"

The Skrem did not answer at once. Rather he turned his head slowly as if to inspect all the pile of their belongings. Then of a sudden, so suddenly, that it brought Jofre to a crouch and ready to defend himself, he turned to the guard.

"This one goes also?"

"He goes," Zurzal assured him.

"He will have a service to offer—when the time is ready. Let him be also ready."